Spotlight on: Thanksgiving

Communication
by Anne Beaty

At its most basic, communication is the exchange of thoughts, ideas, stories, etc., between two or more people. It is the key to understanding another person; it is the balm that soothes all wounds.

So here you are with a screaming baby or preverbal toddler: where’s the communication? It’s right there; you just have to learn to speak their language before they can speak yours.

My youngest sister had her first baby in December. She and her husband noticed that there were times the baby just wouldn’t stop fussing. So Chris would sweep him up and say “hey buddy, there are just too many women around, we need a little guy time” and march off with the baby. It worked every time! He was communicating with a 3 week old.

This kind of communication relies almost entirely on empathy: how YOU might feel in that situation. If the child is fed and dry and still unhappy, s/he is telling you something, and the challenge of parenting small children is to figure out what it is. Offering ‘solutions’ (do you want to go to the park? would you like to play horsy?) usually just sends the child into greater distress. Yelling and threatening, smacks, time-outs: would any of that make you feel better if you were upset? 

Almost always, a small child needs calm and love (besides food). Hold the child, if s/he will let you, otherwise, sit down near them and radiate peacefulness and love. As they start to calm down, offer a banana, and to read them a story. 

When my niece was 2 1/2, she stayed with my son and me while her parents went to Hawaii for a belated honeymoon. I wish I had known one-tenth of what I’ve since learned, but I botched our communication so badly that she wouldn’t speak to me except through my son. It was 5 days of “Julian, please ask Danielle if she would like red sauce or butter on her pasta,” in every possible situation. It was awful!

As they grow, the most important thing you can do is listen, actively listen. An uncommunicative child can be helped along, even if it feels like an interrogation. The point is: they want to communicate, but sometimes they just can’t. Maybe they don’t know how. Maybe it’s not in their nature to be very open (we’ve all known adolescent boys, especially, who just grunt). So we have to teach them: we have to ask, and then ask again: what happened at basketball today? How did you feel about that? Teaching them to think about how they feel is one of our most important tasks, and will serve both them and us well in their older years.

Without communication, everything falls by the wayside, and you will be blind-sided. This is when the police show up at your door because your son has 2 speeding tickets he never took care of (this happened to someone I know). This is when you don’t find out your child is failing math until the report cards come in. There is no discipline without communication, but that’s another story.

Listen to your child: even when s/he is silent.

C) Anne Beaty 2005

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Anne Beaty is the single mother of one son, who graduated from Vassar college in 2005. She was a Special Education T.A. for the Los Angeles Unified School District for 10 years, middle and high school, where she dealt with learning and behaviorally challenged inner-city, minority, and immigrant students, most of whom wouldn't have known a manner if it bit them on the leg. At the moment, she is raising her 16 year old 
niece. Email Anne: Anne Beaty

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